The prime concern of the Labour Ministry to minimise the number of work related injuries and fatalities furthermore even though the rate of Sri Lanka is far below compared to the Asian Pacific region, Skills Development and Labour Relations Minister Nimal Siripala De Silva said.
He was addressing the “National Occupational Safety and Health Conference 2021”, which organized by the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) yesterday in Colombo.
Speaking further the Minister said that of the 8.7 million works force of the country around 1,300 to 1,500 number of occupational injuries is reported annually. The International Labour Organisation (ILO) estimates that a number of 2.3 million women and men around the world succumb to work related accidents and diseases every year, which corresponds to over 6,000 deaths every single day. Worldwide, there are around 340 million occupational accidents and 160 million victims of work related illnesses annually. Moreover 44 per cent of the national GDP of a country will be reduced due to the impact of occupational injuries.
According to the ILO statistics in 2019, the fatal occupational injury rate in Sri Lanka is 1 (one) for 100,000 employees (1/100,000) while South Korea is 4.6/100,000, Mongolia is 4.5/100,000, Myanmar is 3./100,000. The number of workplace fatalities in the country has come down to 30 in 2020from 39 in 2019. This figure translates to a workplace fatal injury rate of 0.9 per 100,000 workers. It is significant that Sri Lanka is somewhat low in fatal accident rate in the Asia Pacific region.
According to the worldwide statistics the highest number of workplace fatalities is reported from the construction industry while the highest number of workplace injuries is reported from construction and manufacturing industries. Sri Lanka is not an exception as the highest number of workplace fatalities in the country is reporting from construction industry and the injuries are from construction and manufacturing industries.
“Accordingly fatal injury rate in Sri Lanka is comparatively low. But it was observed that there is a gross under reporting. However these statistics depicts the importance of work and health interrelationship” Minister Silva added.
Anyhow the number of Occupational Diseases (ODs) has increased slightly by 2 per cent from 17 cases in 2019 to 528 in 2020. The amount was greatly contributed by 344 Covid 19 cases, which were classified as work related cases.
The main objective of the annual National OSH Conference is to share knowledge by the best practicing industries and renowned professionals to develop the capabilities of safety professionals and to create network among the safely environment, he added.
He further said that the NIOSH institute was established in order to facilitate, stimulate and provide awareness of the need for better working environment of the private and private sector. Besides this is a concept, which need to be popularise among all sectors. Whether it is an employee employer, farmer or anyone engages in an occupancy, needs to be educated to be protected and safeguarded from industrial related accidents and diseases.